Singing Is Uniquely Vulnerable
Our voices embody our emotions, our physicality, our thoughts. The voice isn’t separate from the person.
Our life experiences shape us. We all go through a lot to become who we become.
Some people are silenced by their past — by what they were told and what they internalised.
Perfectionism, criticism, shame, rules, or fear from earlier experiences can make people hold their voice back, even years later.
That vulnerability is real. And it’s exactly why how we learn to sing matters.
‘The doing’
My emphasis as a teacher is learning through doing.
Not waiting until you feel ready.
Not aiming for perfection first.
It’s about finding the right space — the right place, the right stage — for now.
Somewhere you can simply do.
That might be with a friend.
With a teacher.
At your local folk club.
Or somewhere much bigger.
It’s not about the size of the space.
It’s about the act of stepping into it.
Doing helps shift the focus away from “Am I good enough?”
Yes, we tweak — that’s what lessons are for.
But growth doesn’t come from perfecting in isolation.
It comes from evolving through consistent doing.
After all, we’re drawn to sing already.
We just need to find the right space for us — for now.
Learning the hard way
I was a classical singer once upon a time, and my standards for myself were perfection.
I know how easy it is to keep trying to improve all the time. It can make our voice ‘a problem’ to be solved, rather than something to be celebrated.
It’s in the doing that we connect with ourselves as singers — that we feel most alive, that we learn the most.
I encourage my clients to practise the freedom required to sing out their souls through Primal Soul Voicework. It’s a five-minute practice that reconnects you with yourself as a singer — as a noisemaker, if you prefer. I encourage my clients to share this explorative exercise with me as often as they like between sessions in our shared portal. I want to create for others the space I couldn’t find myself.
Singing Is More Than the perfection of it’s constituent parts
As singers, we don’t need to micro-manage every sound that comes out of our mouths. That level of self-protection isn’t good for the freedom of our voices — or our souls.
If it hurts or feels bad, of course listen to your body and trust your voice’s feedback. But if it feels good, all is well — even if you’re not quite where you want to be sound-wise. You’re in a good place. The voice is extremely malleable and that stuff is easily learned.
Voices naturally crack, creak, wobble, sound tight at times, even sound ‘ugly’. We can work with all of that. There’s a place for every sound when we’re talking about freedom of expression.
You Don’t Need Anyone’s Approval — You Need Your Own
There is no single standard you have to meet in order to sing. There are simply different stages — different places to sing.
Life is short. And I can tell you that I’ve had as much joy singing to myself, singing at my local folk club, or singing with my teacher as I have singing to thousands of people.
It’s also worth saying that not wanting to perform doesn’t make you “not a singer” or “not an artist”. Plenty of artists don’t perform, or take long periods away from performing.
I believe Artists are born. It has nothing to do with your schedule or your current ability — it has to do with what’s inside you.
You get to develop a relationship with yourself and your own artistry, and no real artist would ever tell you otherwise.
I believe in radical inclusion
I’m a singer. I’m a fellow artist. My aim is to encourage you to explore, evolve, and appreciate what is.
We all need acceptance, kindness, and encouragement — that’s part of being human, and part of every creative journey.
I want healthy voices, yes. But I don’t want compliance, guru status, or for you to stop thinking for yourself. You are your own authority.
We all look to others at times to check that we’re okay, to run ideas by someone else. That’s natural. Just remember: you’re here to make mistakes — to do it wrong. That’s how learning happens.
There are certain words I just hate…..
“Competition” is one of them. I find it deeply disappointing when it’s applied to the arts.
That’s why I’m not the best teacher to work within competitive contexts — for example, TV talent shows. I work with artists, with art, with freedom, beauty, ugliness, and with celebrating all that it is to be human.
It’s hard enough to be oneself without the added idea that everyone is competing. And honestly, I don’t even think it’s true.
Inside the singer’s head there’s often this loop:
“I’m not as good as…” (fill in the blank).
Erghhhh. Contemporary singing is about being yourself, right?
You’re not supposed to sound like anyone else — though if you do for a while, that’s okay too. It’s part of the process.
So yes, be inspired by great singers. Just don’t let comparison stop you.
(And if it is stopping you, you might simply need to get into the arena more — to open yourself up to experience.)
There are amazing artists out there doing their thing, and they’re not “as good as *****” either. They’re doing it their own way.
You’re you.
Be you.
Even if it’s not the best version of you.
That’s what everyone else is doing too.
Primal Soul Voice Work will help you.
The Cost of Holding In
There is a real emotional cost to holding yourself in — to not allowing freedom in the voice.
It often starts as reduced ease or expression, and over time it can turn into real difficulty.
I’d like to help with this. It’s what Expressive Voicework is all about.
The right teacher
I believe teachers need to tell you what’s working, as well as where there’s room to evolve. We all need this. It’s so easy to focus on what’s wrong.
I still experience this myself when listening to recordings of my own music. It’s much easier for me to watch myself live. Listening to recordings can feel like staring in the mirror and analysing every detail, whereas live performance is meant to be an imperfect moment in time. This is much easier for me to accept. And it’s actually the healthiest way to view both.
We all want to be here, now — celebrating life, being present for ourselves, as we are.
“This is the body of a 46-year-old woman who has done all sorts of dodgy things to herself.”
“This is the voice of a girl who was terrified of being less than perfect.”
“This is the teacher who never wants anyone else to suffer this fate.”
Bravery and Damage
Your self-belief is everything, and it’s deeply affected by who you allow into your inner circle.
I’ve had some terrible things said to me about my singing — by teachers, and by friends. I don’t know what they were trying to do. Prove their status? Their worth?
I remember a teacher at the British Academy of New Music saying to me, about my singing,
“You look like you’re enjoying it, but no one else is.”
I also had a producer who consistently tried to break me with unkindness, as if it were some kind of test of strength.
And look — we all make mistakes. I’ve made them too, in my singing and in my teaching, often in an attempt to reassure my own ego. I give others that grace as well. But I recognise it now and I choose better. That’s my responsibility.
This work is a conversation.
A conversation about love and living.
A conversation about the freedom to be.
Fucking Up and Living
So go out there and fuck up royally.
Enjoy the process.
Live, love, laugh, evolve.
Let it begin.
An Invitation
If this resonates, I’d love to encourage you to try some of the work I suggest to my clients — perhaps as a piece of writing, perhaps as a meditation.
- Consider your strengths. What’s good about your voice?
- Ask yourself: how can I look for what’s working in what I do?
- Find a stage or space that feels right for you — it might be alone in a wardrobe, with a friend or teacher, at a folk club, an open mic, a studio, a pub, or a bigger stage. Somewhere you can make vocal noise.
- Stop seeing your voice as broken. The voice is highly malleable.
- Sing and connect with feeling as much as sound.
- Normalise variability. Voices are state-dependent. Day-to-day changes ≠ failure.
- Track evidence, not just goals. What feels easier? What worked today that didn’t before?
- Let go of perfection by appreciating today.
- Replace evaluation with curiosity and laughter.
What did you notice?
Letting go of judgement
So can I just suggest that singers stop judging singers, that teachers stop judging teachers — and every other version of that too. That we all stop policing each other’s voices, choices, and paths.
And importantly: if you’re working with a teacher who tells you not to sing, get the f*ck out. They know nothing about art.
I’ve been silenced many times in my life —
by things people said,
by my lack of perfection,
by my ADHD,
by failing publicly (forgetting the words in front of a lot of people),
by not being “original enough” or having the voice I used to want.
These are the things we work with.
They are what make us artists.
Don’t wait to be perfect to start.
